Evolution of Knowledge Management toward Enterprise Decision
Support: The Case of KPMG
Daniel E. O’Leary
Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Realizing that knowledge and its proper management are essential for effective decision support, this chapter traces the
evolution of knowledge management within a major professional services firm – KPMG. By supporting decision
making, computer-based systems for managing knowledge can impact organizational performance and the very nature
of the organization itself. Here, we examine a progression of knowledge management systems at KPMG, beginning
with the 1997 condition of having disparate or no knowledge management systems and culminating with an enterprisewide integrated system accommodating both locally and globally managed knowledge. Strategically, knowledgemanagement advances were used to transform the firm from being a confederation of local enterprises to a global
enterprise. This chapter investigates why KPMG pursued the development and implementation of a global knowledge
management system. In addition, it summarizes some of the key capabilities and technologies of the resulting
knowledge management system, K-World. This chapter also examines some key implementation issues. Finally, the
chapter investigates two key problems emerging from the use of the system after its introduction: search and client
confidentiality, plus some of the emerging extensions for K-World.
Keywords: Enterprise decision support; Knowledge management system; K-World; KPMG; Professional services
“We are at the vanguard and will leap our competition.” Michael Turillo
1 Introduction
In the early to mid 1980s, KPMG developed a unique vision about knowledge management captured in
their concept of a “Shadow Partner” (Gladstone and Eccles 1995). Supporting clients was not just a job for
people but one that required integrating human and computer activity. KPMG needed to integrate and
evolve their knowledge management system to support their decision needs.
Unfortunately, that vision was not executed at the time, and KPMG went from one limited knowledge
management system (K-Man) to 64 country-specific disparate systems (e.g., K-Web), until they finally
developed an integrated system with locally and globally managed knowledge. Called K-World, its
implementation was so successful at integrating the system into their professionals’ work that shortly after
its implementation, there was an interest in taking K-World public as its own company: Cering. However,
the initial public offering environment changed, and this did not occur. Although ultimately, the
implementation went well, there were some emerging potential issues associated with client confidentiality
and search, plus some emerging system implementation issues.
This chapter is a case study of the evolution of knowledge management within a professional services
firm (KPMG) and some of the problems that it faced, including designing, implementing and using a
system for supporting decision making of their professionals. We examine how knowledge management
technology has been used within KPMG to facilitate transformation from localized collaboration to global
collaboration capabilities, and why such a system might be spun off to be its own company. In so doing,
we analyze key capabilities of such systems and some potential problems. KPMG knowledge management
efforts are reviewed across the time period roughly 1986 to 2006, with detailed focus on 1997 to 2006.
As a result, this chapter brings up-to-date the well known case “KPMG Peat Marwick: The Shadow
Partner,” (Gladstone and Eccles 1991) and “KPMG Peat Marwick U. S.: One Giant Brain” (Alavi 1997).
The later case leaves off in 1997, right before KPMG dropped Netscape’s browser from its design. This
chapter includes some additional background information relating to both of the earlier cases and the
progresses to the current knowledge management system, K-World, and the firm’s analysis of spinning of
K-World as an IPO (Initial Public Offering).
This case is a longitudinal study, examining a single professional services firm, KPMG using two
methodologies: a field study and archival research. KPMG's ultimate use of knowledge management is
traced through multiple technologies across time and organizational issues. The field study was
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unstructured, involving interviews to gather and detail information from KPMG knowledge management
personnel including Robert Elliott (Partner who developed original vision of “Shadow Partner”), Robert
Zeibig (Principal in Charge of Global Knowledge Management), Bernard Avishai, (International Director
of Intellectual Capital) and Michael Turillo (Managing Partner, Knowledge Management, International
Chief Knowledge Officer). Additional information was gathered from users of the KPMG knowledge
management systems. Archival information was gathered from published and Internet sources, including a
Bill Gates’ speech, KPMG presentations, various publications, news releases, and press articles.
Evolution of decision support and knowledge management systems is an emerging area that is gathering
increased attention. O’Leary (2007a) provides a survey of issues that relate to predicting, facilitating and
managing knowledge management system evolution. O’Leary (2007b) provides an empirical investigation
of the evolution of a taxonomy over time. This paper provides a detailed example of the evolution of a
system to illustrate and provide specificity to some of the concepts discussed in those and other papers.
The chapter is organized as follows. Section 2 discusses the importance of knowledge management to
professional services firms, including an analysis of the pre-1997 knowledge management efforts of both
KPMG and other large professional services firms. Section 3 investigates KPMG’s initial efforts into webbased knowledge management in 1997 and the resulting disparate systems. Section 4 summarizes the
reasons KPMG needed to have a global knowledge management system, including the potential loss of
whole countries of offices. Section 5 describes capabilities of K-World, a knowledge management system
built in response to the needs discussed in section 4. Section 5 also lays out the basic capabilities and
architecture of K-World. Section 6 discusses the proposed spin-off of the knowledge management group
and the capabilities of the new firm, while Section 7 briefly summarizes the new company and its product.
Section 8 analyzes the decision to drop the notion of an IPO. Section 9 investigates important emerging
issues, those of search and client confidentiality, and system extensions. Section 10 briefly summarizes the
chapter.
2 How Important is Knowledge Management for Professional Service Firms?
Knowledge management and the corresponding collaboration that it facilitates are critical, and provide a
core value for professional services firms. For example, as noted in Foley (1996), Allen Frank, former
chief technology officer for KPMG, who left KPMG in May 1997, explained
We're basically a giant brain. For us the knowledge management environment is the core
system to achieve competitive advantage.
Similarly, as noted by Ellen Knapp, former vice chairman at Coopers & Lybrand, "all our assets are
knowledge assets." Further, as noted by Frank (Netscape 1997), "At KPMG, our best asset is the
knowledge that resides with each of our professionals. With 18,000 employees in the US alone, distributed
across 120 offices, it's imperative that we share this knowledge to provide the best service possible to our
clients."
Although the notion of a professional services firm being a giant brain is arguable, it is clear that
professional services firms see the importance of knowledge management: the need to be able to share
knowledge to support professionals’ decision making; and the fact that the primary asset professional
services firms have is in the knowledge they can bring to clients. We might view the function of such a
firm as being a joint human-computer system ultimately supporting their clients. For it to be successful at
this decision support, KPMG went through an evolution toward providing integrated decision support
system for its professionals in support of their clients. At the outset, KPMG had limited systems’ ability to
facilitate knowledge distribution across the firm. Instead, knowledge was locked into pockets limited by
geographical boundaries, personal relationships, and limited system capabilities and integration.
2.1 KPMG’s Early Knowledge Management Efforts
KPMG is a professional services firm, one of the so-called "big 4" – formerly “big 6” and then “big 5” (the
largest professional services firms now also include Ernst & Young, Deloitte & Touche and
PriceWaterhouseCoopers - formerly Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand). KPMG was one of the
first of the professional services firms to explore using technology to facilitate knowledge management in
the classic case study “KPMG Peat Marwick: Shadow Partner” (Gladstone and Eccles 1995).
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In the early 1980’s Robert Elliott, a partner with KPMG, developed the vision of a “Shadow Partner.”
This computer version of a partner would provide decision, knowledge, and administrative support to
KPMG partners. As discussed in Gladstone and Eccles (1995), the shadow partner could have a range of
capabilities designed to support their professionals, including;
 monitor news feeds for information relevant to clients, and then notify the partner of the activity
 provide access to libraries of previous engagements and proposals
 provide access to information about staff that perform particular types of engagements
 allow access to mailing lists of experts within particular areas
 provide access to project information for those projects where the partner is in-charge
 provide calendaring
 provide on-line training
 provide access to information about various key client personnel, and who knows them.
In 1986 a committee was formed at KPMG to advise KPMG regarding the adoption of a system to facilitate
communication, coordination, and collaboration. In 1989, proposals for the Shadow Partner knowledge
management system were presented to KPMG partners, at meetings in both the US and Europe.
In October 1990, Jon Madonna was elected CEO (Chief Executive Officer). It was not until April 1991
that Madonna met with Elliott about Shadow Partner, possibly suggesting a limited interest in the concept.
In 1991, KPMG was faced with potentially implementing the system at different levels of costs ranging
from $30 million to $100 million. However, rather than implement Shadow Partner, from 1989 - 1991, a
specific department, "KPMG Consulting," implemented a system referred to as "K-Man" using "First
Class" (Siboni 1997). From 1994 to 1995, K-Man was diffused to the rest of the firm (Siboni 1997). At the
time of implementation, First Class provided relatively limited capabilities beyond proprietary e-mail.
Although information could be stored in folders, there were limited search capabilities. For example, the
primary means of categorizing information for search was through eight character folder and file names. As
a result, rather than having a “Shadow Partner” by the beginning of 1996, KPMG had K-Man, an
instantiation of First Class, a commercial email package that would provide only limited support for their
professionals.
Madonna remained CEO until October 1996, when Steve Butler was elected CEO and Roger Siboni was
elected as the new COO. In 2002 Eugene O’Kelly took over as CEO, until 2004. It would be after October
1996 that extensive knowledge management support would be built at KPMG.
2.2 Knowledge Management at the Rest of the Professional Services Firms
By 1996, virtually all of the other Big 6 professional services firms had substantial knowledge management
systems, typically implemented using Lotus Notes, but increasingly placed in an Internet and Web
environment. Price Waterhouse had been the first in 1989 (Mehler 1992). Arthur Andersen followed
closely behind and was the first to move to the Internet with “Knowledgespace.com.” Shortly after, Ernst
and Young focused heavily on knowledge management, ultimately developing one of the more
sophisticated systems among the professional services firms (Svary and Chard 1997). Coopers & Lybrand
implemented Lotus Notes in 1994 (Lotus Press Release, January 4, 1994). Further, Coopers & Lybrand had
been rated one of the most 25 innovative intranets (Information Week 1997). Price Waterhouse and
Coopers & Lybrand later merged to create PricewaterhouseCoopers. Deloitte and Touche implemented
Lotus Notes in 1995. In late 1996, Banks (1996) singled out Ernst & Young, Coopers & Lybrand, and
Arthur Andersen as being the leading professional services firms in terms of knowledge management.
During the time period 1998-2000, Andersen, Ernst & Young, and PricewaterhouseCoopers each finished
in the top 20 of the most admired knowledge enterprises, a survey of the leading knowledge management
firms in the world (Chase 2001). However, KPMG was not in the top twenty any of those years.
Research into knowledge management at professional service firms has continued with a number of case
studies. KPMG was the focus of two studies, one involving the original vision (Gladstone and Eccles 1995)
and the other looking at early version of their knowledge management system (Alavi 1997). Andersen
Consulting, which became known as Accenture, also was the focus of two case studies about their
knowledge management system (Savary and Chard 1997, Meister and Davenport 2005). Ernst & Young,
and then later Cap Gemini Ernst & Young also was a focus of later case studies (Lara, et al. 2004).
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3. K-Web, D-Web, U-Know, …
In the United States, according Roger Siboni (1997), the notion of a web-based collaborative knowledge
management system at KPMG, dubbed "K-Web," was introduced in 1994, as a concept and piloted in 1996
using Netscape as the basis for the system. Elliott (1997) dubbed Siboni’s (1997) presentation as the
“solution” to the classic Shadow Partner case (Gladstone, J. and Eccles, 1995). After Siboni took over as
COO in October 1996, KPMG began the implementation of web-based technology for knowledge
management purposes.
In January of 1997, KPMG in the U. S. decided to build K-Web using Netscape's Communicator and
Suitespot (Netscape 1997), "… to increase internal collaboration as part of an enhanced knowledge sharing
environment." As originally designed (Netscape 1997),
… K-Web, project team members will be able to work on shared documents as well as
send and receive Web-based mail messages, extend discussions to their partners and
clients, and ultimately automate business processes. KPMG is planning to use K-Web to
hold town hall meetings over the Intranet, engage in sophisticated chat sessions and to
make it easier for KPMG professionals to locate colleagues. K-Web will also serve as the
front end for accessing information in legacy databases internally about particular KPMG
clients and projects.
However, during the middle of their knowledge management system implementation, in July 1997, KPMG
chose to drop Netscape and adopt Microsoft products at the same time that an alliance with Microsoft was
announced. This action apparently ended up as part of a legal case against Microsoft (US Department of
Justice 1998).
This delay stalled KPMG knowledge management efforts, but also made the point that choosing
Microsoft technology had additional benefits, beyond the knowledge management system. As noted in
KPMG (1999b) by Charles Stevens, vice president of the application developers’ customer unit at
Microsoft, "KPMG will be able to assist their clients in developing and implementing their own knowledge
management system based on the Microsoft platform." As a result, the choice of knowledge management
technology is more than meeting internal requirements and supporting professionals’ decisions. It can be a
function of other purpose alliances.
As it turns out, in addition to forming an alliance with Microsoft, KPMG (1999b) was one of the first five
firms to "… embark on its fast track program to fully exploit the power of the Web Browser, integrate
Microsoft-based messaging, collaboration and knowledge-sharing applications…."
At roughly this same time, KPMG Germany began developing "D-Web" (“D” for “Deutsch”), and
KPMG in the U.K. was developing "U-Know" (“U” for United Kingdom). Similar efforts took place in
KPMG offices in other countries, including, Canada, the Netherlands, Australia, and South Africa. As with
K-Web in the United States, each of these efforts was designed to leverage web technology into knowledge
management. However, users in one country generally were unable to access the knowledge management
systems in other countries. For example, KPMG users in Canada were unable to use K-Web in the United
States. KPMG had a disparate set of knowledge management systems. In still other countries there was no
digital knowledge management. Systems could not communicate or there were no systems available.
Accordingly, at the time, KPMG did not have a true global knowledge management system. Systems met
some support needs but did not integrate systems. Effectively, decision support was still geographically
limited.
4 Was There a Need for a Globally Integrated Knowledge Management System?
Accordingly, by the end of 1997, KPMG did not have a globally integrated knowledge management
system. Instead, there were different countries pursuing their own systems. According to Boom (2004)
there were 64 different intranets scattered throughout the company. In addition, at this time the decision
making focus of professionals, and support of those decisions was largely local. For example, Boom (2000)
noted the following quotes from KPMG interviews at the time:
 “I only work with local clients”
 “Why change, we already have a legacy system”
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 “There are too many cultures in KPMG” (for a global system)
This raises the question, “Was there a need for a globally integrated knowledge management system?”
Starting at the end of 1997, at least four factors appeared to drive the need for KPMG to pursue a globally
integrated knowledge management system to support professionals’ decisions: competition, a need to
collaborate for the larger engagements and more profitable engagements, keeping the firm together, and
decreasing costs.
4.1 Competition
In October 1997, a merger was announced between KPMG and Ernst & Young (Ernst & Young and
KPMG 1997), although it never took place. Zeibig (2000) indicated that as part of the merger activities
KPMG and Ernst & Young were made aware of each other’s knowledge management systems. In February
1998, after the failed merger between KPMG and Ernst & Young, KPMG’s international chairman noted
(MacDonald and Lublin 1998), “Going into the merger our perception of Ernst & Young was that they
were ahead of us in knowledge-management systems and communications. Our discussions confirmed
that.” Human-system integration and decision support for professionals lagged at KPMG compared to Ernst
& Young.
4.2 Globalization: Larger More Profitable Engagements
One of the driving forces for K-World implementation was the need to globalize and move to larger
engagements. According to Zeibig (2000), the largest engagements were global and these had the highest
profit margin. These engagements required coordination of collaboration across multiple countries using
knowledge management. Unfortunately, during 1998 and the beginning of 1999 (Turillo 2001), KPMG was
global in appearance, but not in reality. Different cultures, business cultures, and languages stood in the
way of being a global firm. Competing for a large audit client forced KPMG to realize that their knowledge
management system needed to have global support capabilities.
Decision support for professionals needed to be integrated across geographic boundaries. Unfortunately,
the independent knowledge management systems in each country did not facilitate the ability to mobilize
resources on a global basis. In fact, disparate systems stood in the way. Although KPMG had offices
around the world, the independent knowledge management systems made it impossible for their
professionals to fully collaborate. However, competing for the high margin profit engagements required
having a knowledge management system that would allow the firm to collaborate globally across its many
offices.
4.3 Keeping the Firm Together
More than just profitability was at stake. Collaborating on engagements influenced the ability to keep
clients and firm members. As noted in the Wall Street Journal (May 27, 1999), "Last month, top partners at
KPMG Canada threatened to defect to Arthur Andersen, citing as one of their reasons the difficulty in
serving multinational clients due to KPMG's unintegrated systems." The future of the KPMG was
dependent on globally linking the firm's different offices and their knowledge management systems.
Without an integrated system the future of the firm as a single, independent entity was threatened.
4.4 Redundant Information and Systems, and Extra Costs
Furthermore, according to Bill Gates (1999a), during 1998 there were substantial knowledge resource and
software redundancies, resulting in extra costs. For example, dozens of offices were buying the same
information and there were three email systems. Further, according to Turillo (Grzanka 1999), KPMG used
13 different messaging systems, six different knowledge management systems, and multiple human
resources, finance, and payroll systems on at least six different operating systems. Driving down costs
would require system integration and elimination of redundancy.
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4.5 Local Materials and Control
Although there was a need for a global system, there remained tensions for the ability of different countries
to add and control their own materials. For example, because accounting and audit principles differ from
country to country, auditors in one country are likely to need daily access to different materials than
auditors in other countries. Some decision support needs varied. Further, the rate of change of those
materials is likely to differ. Accordingly, there was a tension between the need for a global system and
global resources, versus a local system and local resources. As a result, individual countries and other
organizational units maintained the ability to add materials and servers to K-World.
5 K-World
In the middle of 1998, Siboni left KPMG (Abate 1998). That also seemed to be the end of K-Web as the
“solution” to the “Shadow Partner” case. However, it was also becoming clear that it was important for
KPMG to mobilize resources on a global basis to meet the competition and procure the more profitable
engagements. Integrated decision support for professionals was necessary for more profitable engagements.
As a result, in part of an announcement indicating that KPMG would be combining firms in the Americas
and Europe, to form regions, as a basis to serve global clients in a world-wide consolidation, Stephen
Butler, former CEO and Chairperson, also announced the advent of K-World, indicating that (KPMG 1998)
Being global means being capable of accessing the same information at the same time,
regardless of whether you're in New York or New Delhi.…This knowledge management
system is transforming KPMG's embedded intellectual capital into a global strategic asset
- and it’s enhancing KPMG's ability to collaborate with other organizations, irrespective
of their messaging environments. A single knowledge repository allows us to access
global sources of information, limit redundant information searches, and streamline the
development of client deliverables anywhere.
K-World was seen as more than just knowledge management. Its global decision support would be an
enabler for a new organization structure, and it would allow the firm to be able to compete for the more
profitable engagements. As a result, K-World led to a change in the priorities of the firm. Chief Executive
Paul Reilly called K-World (Cone 1999), "the No. 1 priority of the global firm."
On June 9, 1999, KPMG began the roll out of K-World to the United States, United Kingdom, Germany
and the Netherlands (KPMG 1999b). It also announced that K-World would be deployed to Canada,
Australia, Sweden, and Switzerland. By August 2000, all KPMG users had been brought into the system.
By 2001 many of the disparate legacy systems had been shut down (Boom 2004).
5.1 Capabilities
The vision of Shadow Partner, and more, was actualized in K-World. According to Gates (1999a), K-World
was designed to connect and support KPMG's 93,000 people worldwide, in order to provide a corporate
memory for collaboration (Gates 1999a):
The consulting companies have really seen that this is a key area for them to try to jump
onto first, because they have a variety of engagements all over the world with different
kinds of industries. … [T]hey'd like to share the learning that has gone on.
One of the key themes to illustrate the concepts associated with the original Shadow Partner case was
how the system could be used to facilitate the merger of a client. In order to test K-World, this scenario was
used to examine the existence of time economies associated with using the system (Management
Consultancy 2000). As noted by Gates 1999b
… the ability to pull together all key members of the global team in order to make
decisions and recommendations. What would have taken 80 hours in the past took only
one hour in a test and resulted in a smarter firm with a deeper understanding of customer
needs.
K-World design was aimed at facilitating collaborative communities of practice. As noted by Michael
Turillo, KPMG's Chief Knowledge Officer,
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Knowledge is content in context and our global communities of practice – who marry
knowledge about complex services to specific industries – determine K-World's
contextual frames. K-World brings qualified internal content and filtered external content
to each community …
Ultimately, K-World has been designed with a wide range of resources to support the professional’s
efforts. For example, as noted by Trotman (2003), K-World resources include access to company financial
statements, audit engagement tools (such as financial disclosure checklists), and training materials.
Professionals can employ those materials to support their own and collaborative decision making.
Interaction with Clients
K-World was designed for internal KPMG use. However, there also was a need to integrate decision
support with clients. KPMG professionals and clients needed to generate and access some of the same
materials. Thus, KPMG needed a collaboration tool through the internet.
Accordingly, in 2000 K-Client was deployed (Boom 2000). K-Client was designed to facilitate
communication and collaboration within globally deployed KPMG teams and with clients. K-Client
provides workflow management capabilities, and the ability to gather and organize large amounts of
information from a wide range of sources. While K-World was designed for internal use, K-Client was
designed for internal and client interaction.
Knowledge Architecture
Information in K-World is categorized based on a hierarchical taxonomy to support professionals’ decision
making. According to Boom (2000) the design was aimed to “let people use the Global Taxonomy to find
solutions from other cultures. See Exhibit 1 for a sample screen.
Exhibit 1. Sample Screen
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The taxonomy had three dimensions: Product, Industry Segment and Geography, mirroring the firm’s
organization structure. For example, at the highest level there is product information, industry segment
information, or geography information. Under product, the user might choose “Assurance,” under
Assurance, the user might choose “Advisory Services,” and so forth. Under industry, the user might select
“Global Industry Groups.” Information also is categorized by news, clients, library, and other categories.
5.2 Technology for K-World
The importance of the underlying technology for K-World was echoed by Turillo, in a statement that ended
up generating some controversy in the knowledge management community (Hildebrand 1999):
"Knowledge management cannot be done without technology." White (1999) describes a design of the
global network infrastructure for K-World, labeled “K-Net.”
KPMG had decided to use Netscape during Allen Frank's tenure as Chief Technology Officer. However,
although KPMG had been using Netscape prior to the time of K-World's development, K-World was based
on Microsoft products (Kane 1997), which linked countries together using the Internet (KPMG 1998).
Shortly after that decision, Netscape was criticized for failing to make inroads among the Fortune 1000
(Bowman 1997).
On the other hand, some questioned Microsoft's ability to provide the software and the know-how for
knowledge management (Johnston and Davis 1999). As noted by an analyst at Meta Group, David
Yockelson, (Johnson and Davis 1999), "While there is not one platform to tackle knowledge management,
Lotus (Notes) does have many of the piece-parts you might desire, and Microsoft doesn't. Microsoft has
things on an agenda, which is to come up with those piece-parts and also be a platform provider to third
parties who will come up with piece-parts."
KPMG used a number of third party products to piece together the technology for K-World. For
example, in addition to Windows NT Server, SQL Server, Exchange, Site Server, Outlook, Office, and
Internet Explorer, KPMG also include collaboration software from Silknet Software, portal software from
Sageware, other software and services from Razorfish, and NewsEdge news solutions (NewsEdge 2000).
As noted by Yokelson (Johnston and Davis 1999), "One could argue that having to put the pieces
together isn't the best thing." However, that piecing together process is where additional value was created
by KPMG's knowledge management group.
5.3 People and Costs
Knowledge management with a system like K-World can require substantial human resources. As a result,
knowledge management efforts resulted in a shift of personnel from other functions in order to facilitate the
system introduction. With K-World, there was a shift in the function of personnel from library department
to a knowledge management department (e.g., Boom 2000).
Boom (2000, 2004) notes that there was a knowledge management staff in The Netherlands throughout
the time frame 2000-2004. In 2002, after K-World was largely implemented there were about 40 people in
the UK knowledge management group (Autonomy 2002). Ultimately, Turillo's development and
implementation of K-World with a team of 55 developers (Flash 2001a) took place in the Boston Office,
over a period of two and a half years. At the same time, there also were 15 full-time knowledge editors in
the New York Office, charged with capturing knowledge from published papers, books, speeches, and
magazine articles (Glasser 1999).
The capabilities provided by K-World did not come inexpensively, and probably not surprisingly
apparently exceeded the original Shadow Partner estimates. Ultimately, in just the first five months of 1998
KPMG spent over $40 million on the knowledge management initiative (Glasser 1999). Further, as noted in
the Wall Street Journal (May 27, 1999),
Worried about partner defections, Big Five accounting and consulting firm KPMG
International said it will spend $100 million to more fully tie together its world-wide
computer systems.
… KPMG's attempt to develop a new global "digital nervous system" marks the first time
that the firm has devoted such a large amount of money to a computer overhaul.
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KPMG typically spends $50 million a year on upgrading its computers.
KPMG indicated that they planned to spend more than $400 million on K-World through 2002 (Cone
1999). The first $10 million was for designing the technical architecture. $100 million was for the first
year, and $115 million was for the second year. Yearly expenditures were planned to level out to about $80
million per year by 2002. External content purchases were planned at roughly $20 million per year.
5.4 Implementation
One of the first implementation concerns was the notion that K-World was focused too much on or about
the United States. For example, as noted in Boom (2000) at the time of the implementation some typical
comments included:
 “There is only US – based information on K-World.”
 “K-World is US driven.”
This was a potential problem because of cultural differences between offices in different countries
summarized in Exhibit 2 (generated by KPMG, Boom 2000). When cast along two dimensions of
(equalitarian vs. hierarchical) and (person vs. process) countries laid out in different quadrants. Based on
this two dimensional diagram, the complaint against a US driven system would result in a system that was
more focused on processes than people, and less hierarchical than other settings. A K-World that was
focused on one quadrant potentially would not be well received in a global firm. Somehow implementation
would need to accommodate or mitigate potential differences.
Egalitarian
USA
Intellect
NL
Information
UK
Person oriented
India
Germany
Process oriented
Information
France
Interaction
South
Korea
Hierarchical
Exhibit 2. Country Dimensions of Knowledge (Boom 2000)
Cultural Transformation
Accordingly, a number of steps were taken to transform the culture and facilitate system evolution
(Boom 2000). First, the technological structure allowed professionals to communicate with each other and
learn about corresponding views. Second, professionals were trained to use, and trained in the benefits of,
globally-used best practices, but adapted to meet local needs. In addition, there also was training in other
culture awareness. Third, the system allowed capturing knowledge in each different geographic area. This
would allow professionals to find solutions from other countries and cultures. Fourth, the system was built
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to allow multiple languages. As a result, they could put solutions in their own context. Finally, an
international content acquisition workgroup was found to try to ensure that appropriate international
resources were built into the system to support decision making (Bloom 2004).
Ultimately, a three-phase “cultural transformation model was planned (Exhibit 3), that included an
adoption phase, loyalty phase and collaboration phase (Boom 2000). Planned cultural transformation for KWorld, started with “awareness,” moved to “loyalty,” and finished with “institutionalization.”
Exhibit 3. K-World Cultural Transformation (Boom 2000)
The cultural transformation model paralleled the system development and evolution. At the “awareness”
and “interest” states in the adoption phase only basic design information, and possibly a prototype is
necessary. In order to progress to “installation” and “repeated use,” an existing system with sufficient
resources to draw the users back is necessary. In the loyalty phase, in order to obtain “positive perception”
the implemented system must be operational, providing integration across multiple countries in order to
obtain global benefits. For users to “recommend to others” the system there generally need to be greater
benefits than the existing legacy systems. In the collaboration phase, links to multiple countries and client
capabilities need to be established to realize global capabilities that ultimately would facilitate
“internalization” and ultimately, “institutionalization,” where K-World becomes integrated into the fabric
of the firm.
Technology-Enabled Implementation
KPMG apparently also used a technology-enabled (e.g., O’Leary 2000) approach to facilitate change. As
noted by Colin Sharman, Chairman of KPMG (White 1999), “KPMG is globalizing and K-World … is
both the product and the catalyst for this transformation.” Technology was being used to drive the
implementation across multiple geographic locations. Technology-enabled approaches are often used to
drive change in global organizations, in part, because the focus is on the need for technology similarities
rather than cultural differences. The focus on technologies appears to minimize the apparent impact of
some of the cultural differences.
10
Local Differences
Further, each individual country's systems (e.g., U-Know) and office systems (e.g., specific cities) still
held local information. English is used at the global level; however, a country's specific language could be
used at the local and office level. In addition, individual business units can have their own servers, which
facilitate capture and presentation of unit specific knowledge. Both the individual and business-specific
servers were connected to the same infrastructure that was K-World.
Local knowledge remains outside the control of K-World. It is administered and created locally. Online
countries appoint local content managers who are responsible for adding knowledge (Power 2000a). Local
knowledge is not necessarily globally indexed within the K-World taxonomy. However, as noted by one
user, "in general, the first place I look is (locally)." Further, as noted by another user, "With our (businessspecific server) we have all the knowledge I use, plus we have links to all the important K-World
knowledge." K-World provides the infrastructure and link point to a wide range of other knowledge
sources. As a result, knowledge could remain local, but was globally accessible .
5.5 Quality of K-World (Chase 2001)
By 2001, the quality of K-World had become apparent. In June 2001, a poll of knowledge management
experts was made to determine the "Most Admired Knowledge Enterprises." Four of the Big 5 were named
among the 37 finalists: Andersen, Ernst & Young, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and KPMG. KPMG finished
13th, behind Ernst & Young 12th and Andersen 11th. At the time KPMG's Global Chief Knowledge Officer
noted that "Knowledge sharing is a core value in KPMG and underpins our current and future ability to
serve our clients worldwide."
6. Spinning Off K-World (Turillo 2001)
In November 2000, Merrill Lynch put together a report on a potential new firm, “Cering,” whereby KPMG
would spin-off K-World. K-World had a number of investors, including Microsoft, that were providing
venture capital to support the spin-off. Michael Turillo, Partner-in-Charge of knowledge management (and
K-World), would be the new CEO of the emerging company (Flash 2001a). Why was KPMG going to spin
off K-World? Turillo explained that it was a function of costs, client interests, SEC constraints, emerging
technology capabilities, a desire for return on investment, and a lack of fit with KCI (KPMG Consulting).
6.1 Costs
The K-World cost per user had been higher than was expected. Further, because all users were now on the
system, there were no other users to drive down the cost per user. In addition, maintaining the position of
the system on the technology curve required additional spending and maintenance. Otherwise, there would
be the unintended consequence of slipping back to where the firm had been prior to K-World. As a result,
another way of generating additional funding was required.
6.2 Clients Wanted It
After Bill Gates (1999a and 1999b) mentioned the system at the CEO Summit in 1999, a number of KPMG
clients became interested in the system and wanted to have the system capabilities. They recognized that
the system offered more than they had in their own knowledge management systems. In addition, Flash
(2001b) noted that after KPMG started using K-World internally, they had hooked some clients to the
portal. KPMG had created an asset.
The Director of Knowledge Technologies at International Data Corporation, felt that K-World could
provide links to clients (Grzanka 1999): "Today it is an internal capability with potential for leveraging out
to customers. Over the long term, it can form the basis of an electronic umbilical cord."
However, because of KPMG’s work in assurance, the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) limited
the work that KPMG could do to implement knowledge management systems, and their ability to provide
knowledge management to clients.
11
6.3 A Way to Further Exploit Emerging Technology
K-World was built to meet the current requirements of KPMG, which did not include mobile computing
capabilities. However, recent developments in technology suggest that mobile computing be built into the
system and more fully leveraged. Breaking away from KPMG would provide resources that would allow
the knowledge management group the ability to provide mobile computing-based knowledge management
as part of a continued evolution of K-World.
6.4 After Spending Millions, KPMG asked “Can We Get ROI?”
KPMG had put millions of dollars into this system. Unfortunately, knowledge management is often seen as
overhead. Costs can be readily seen, but it may be hard to trace specific revenues generated by using the
system. One approach to potentially realizing return on investment was to spin it off as its own company,
particularly in the initial public offering (IPO) environment of the times. As an IPO, K-World could
generate substantial additional funds and not increase costs.
6.5 Why Not Make It Part of KCI (KPMG Consulting)?
An alternative approach was to make the knowledge management group and K-World part of KPMG
Consulting Incorporated (KCI). However, there were at least three reasons for not making it a part of KCI:
 KCI defined its space as the systems integrator and e-business spaces. Knowledge management is
not even in the top 10 of KCI business issues.
 In 2000, KCI was spun off as part of an IPO (KPMG 2000a). KPMG did not want there to be any
distractions for the spin off. In any IPO, there is a need for focus. Worrying about K-World would
detract from that focus.
 Finally, KPMG used an approach that minimizes the need for consulting, so there was no real
need for KCI.
In addition, KPMG spent two years taking KCI public: an experience that could be used to take the
knowledge management group public. Ultimately, KCI went public under the name “BearingPoint”
(http://www.bearingpoint.com/), but it did not include the knowledge management group.
7 The New Company and Product (Avishai 2001)
Cering, the new company, would focus on providing a system that consisted of products from twenty
vendors, and devote its attention to knowledge management across four basic dimensions, including an
enterprise portal, collaboration/messaging, business intelligence, and knowledge management consulting.
The target customer would be a company that wanted a solution to its knowledge management problems,
but is either unwilling or unable to integrate the products to get that solution. As noted by Avishai, “We are
like a 'fund manager,' we look for the best vendor, and swap technologies in and out. We deliver a Rolls
Royce off the shelf. Alternatively, if a company is interested, we could take a role as an application service
provider."
7.1 Taxonomy
One of the key knowledge management issues is the taxonomy used to categorize knowledge in the system
as a basis for search and other purposes. KPMG’s knowledge management group found that about 30% of a
company’s taxonomy may take customization, and 70% is part of the emerging general language of
business. For a given business, it can take 2-3 months to construct the taxonomy. In addition, the taxonomy
needs to be revisited every 3-5 months to bring the taxonomy up-to-date. As a result, development time and
costs and maintenance can be substantial.
Ultimately, the K-World taxonomy reflects the organization structure and view of the world in which
KPMG does business. As noted by Power (2000b), the taxonomy is managed by KPMG's director of
intellectual capital and is based on an agreed view of the business, its locations, and the functions and
industries in which it operates. The importance of the taxonomy is that it forms the basis of search in K-
12
World, rather than using single search, single request-type enquiries (Power 2000b). The issue of the
taxonomy and search is discussed further in section 9.
7.2 Merrill Lynch Report
According to Flash (2001b), Merrill Lynch, praised the potential leadership of Cering in a November 2000
report saying, “(Cering) has the strongest management team we have seen, and in the end the story is the
same. People, not technology, win the software game based on execution. We believe that Cering is well
positioned to leverage its KPMG heritage to assume an early leadership role in the (enterprise portal)
space.”
8 Planned IPO for Cering Dropped
Knowledge management at professional services firms is expensive. The costs of being an early mover in
1991 with Shadow Partner were between $30 million and $100 million. The yearly costs of K-World were
reportedly $100 million (or more), $50 million more than the normal level of expenses. The technology
curve had moved and it would continue to move. As noted above, realizing the change in technology,
KPMG sought to find a return on this overhead function, and planned to spin it off to be its own company.
In August 2000 (Southworth 2000), Rod McKay was named KPMG's "Chief Knowledge Officer." Later
(Shoesmith 2001), McKay was quoted as being the "Global Chief Knowledge Officer," an offshoot of his
role as KPMG Canada's Chief Technology Officer and Chief Knowledge Officer. At the time of his
appointment, McKay noted "Knowledge sharing is a core value within KPMG."
During the summer of 2001, KPMG decided to not pursue the Cering IPO plan. The environment for
IPOs was substantially different than it had been earlier in 2000. Both Bernie Avishai and Michael Turillo
left the firm. Robert Zeibig joined another part of KPMG.
In late August 2001, as part of a "realignment of priorities within the organization," McKay announced
that KPMG was laying off 50 members of the knowledge management group in the Boston Office
(Goodison 2001). As further noted by McKay (Goodison 2001), "The people affected are or were in the
knowledge management activities of our firm, maintaining and developing informational databases -- the
application content that really supports our businesses throughout KPMG globally."
9. Emerging Issues
By 2002, after K-World’s implementation and roll-out continued the system was well-received, and largely
complete, including shutting down some local legacy systems (e.g., Boom 2004). However, there were still
some emerging issues and system extensions.
9.1 Search
Initially, search was designed so that users would locate K-World resources by establishing a “context”
using the taxonomy that would provide them with a list of items (KPMG 1999c). Context was set by three
main parameters: Product, Business Segment, and Geography. By setting the context using those
parameters the basic matrix organizational structure of the firm would be built into the knowledge
management system. Then, given specified parameters, there were additional content selectors that
provided greater detail: News, Overviews, Clients and Targets, Engagements (active and completed),
Discussions, Library, KPMG Services, and Inside KPMG (See Exhibit 4).
In a short period of time, the number of knowledge resources (document lists) became substantial,
making search difficult. For example, within the context established in exhibit 4, how much material might
be in “Technical Resources” or “Tools and Templates” and how might we search those resources. As a
result, just as search was a defining issue in KPMG’s K-Man system, where only documents in text format
could be searched, search emerged as a critical issue in K-World. Finding knowledge was difficult, unless
you knew where to look and what to look for. At least four other reasons were behind emerging difficulties
with search.
13
First, the existence of K-World increased the number and document types of postings. Now, it was not
difficult technically to post materials. For example, as noted in Felt (2004), “there was a day when the UK
intranet had a quarter of a million Web pages … (then) the business went into overdrive and anything that
could go online went online—without any discipline.” This had at least two consequences: The number and
type of documents exploded. As a result, this complicated search efforts, making the selection of
knowledge from that set of resources even more difficult, leading to the next issue.
Exhibit 4. Search Example
Second, the Chief Knowledge Officer in the UK noted (Felt 2004) “Our users suffer from the same
malaise that many Internet users suffer from—they are lazy in constructing queries. … They neither have
the patience nor the time to sift through long result lists in order to find the information they need.”
Although search was possible, it was not easy.
Third, if search within a single country such as the UK was difficult, imagine when that search needed to
broadened to multiple countries. As Turillo once noted (Glasser 1999) “KPMG was not so much a global
company as it was a collection of geographically identified franchises." Unfortunately, this resulted in
knowledge silos at KPMG (Raghavan 2001). The existence of those knowledge silos, coupled with
decentralized resources and architecture, also made finding knowledge resources difficult.
Fourth, when KPMG initially adopted Microsoft Exchange, the K-World architecture called for use of
tagging documents for search capabilities (e.g., KPMG 2000c). Further, as noted in Felt (2004) “We
believe that you can’t just automatically go around and auto-classify and auto-search and auto-understand
everything without any effort at all … Having the ability to use domain expertise to instill discipline in our
information environment yields enormous benefits.” Unfortunately, manual tagging is costly and time
consuming, and because it is manual, the quality is inevitably uneven.
Accordingly, because of the limited search capabilities, some countries in the KPMG federation of
offices have tried to develop solutions to improve search of K-World. Because of the decentralized
structure, different countries were in a position to pursue their own solutions. According to Felt (2004), the
UK adopted its own technology solution to search – going with Verity. Autonomy (2002) indicated that
14
KPMG in the UK also was pursuing the use of a recommendation engine which recognized the social
networks that exist within a corporate online environment and automatically suggests documents and
identifies the experts who have used them.
However, apparently other countries were free to try alternative approaches. Accordingly, global search
still faced a number of limitations.
9.2 Client Information
One of the key potential problems associated with knowledge management systems in professional services
firms is the potential lack of client confidentiality, and resulting misuse of client information. Ian McBride,
KPMG Australia's chief knowledge officer at the time of the K-World introduction noted (Power 2000a),
We have to assure our clients that we will not be putting their confidential information on
K-World and that there is no logical link between K-World and that data. Rather, what is
there are experiences, best practices and proposals without client names or fees.
Further, according to ETW (2003) “Client names and confidential information are removed from stored
documents which are used as examples of best practices.” In addition, KPMG has a “Code of Conduct” that
includes many references to client confidentiality (KPMG 2006). As a result, according to McBride, KWorld does not currently contain client-sensitive knowledge.
Unfortunately, some of the key advantages of the original design and story of the “Shadow Partner,”
included knowledge about which clients, that specific work had been done for and what was charged for
that work (Gladstone and Eccles 1995). For example, if work is done for similar companies in the same
industry, that industry knowledge could be very useful in guiding design of proposed work for others with
similar problems in the same industries or choosing who should work on the engagement or knowing what
to charge. Without company names, finding and choosing relevant resources can become substantially
more difficult. Instead of being built into the system, client name information would only be available in
the memories of the particular users. Accordingly, over time such information would be lost. As a result, it
is important to note that it was anticipated that the next release of K-World would have a security model
built around it that would enable KPMG to publish more specific information that would facilitate search,
but which will still not be client-identifiable (Power 2000b).
9.3 System Extensions
A number of system extensions were planned for K-World to further support professionals' decision
making, facilitating K-World evolution, including (e.g., Boom 2004)
 Newsletters on Industry Sectors
 Personal Portals
 Knowledge Maps
 Alacra
As librarians were shifted into knowledge management, adding research to K-World became more feasible.
Librarians could be active contributors to K-World by adding knowledge that they generated from an
analysis of various data sources. Proposed newsletters about particular industry sectors could include
researched emerging developments, such as the impact of new technologies or other emerging
developments.
Yahoo! was among the first to come up with the well-received concept of allowing personal portals, such
as My Yahoo! Accordingly, as a potential extension, it is not surprising that K-World was also focused on
potentially providing its users with personal portals that they could customize to meet particular client and
decision support needs. Personal portals could help users rapidly use the resources that they found the most
helpful and insightful.
Knowledge maps show who has knowledge and who uses or needs that knowledge. They can be used to
facilitate understanding processes or flows of knowledge, or built to support group processes. There are
ultimately several approaches used to construct these maps. For example, one approach is to use e-mail
message maps to understand flows of knowledge. Alternatively, such maps can be hand-built or customized
to meet the requirements of particular processes. In any case, development of knowledge maps can lead to
changes in processes or understanding why processes operate as they do.
15
Alacra is a company that packages multiple sources of financial knowledge for supporting users. As a
result, they provide a single point of departure for knowledge, allowing a company to outsource some of its
knowledge management functions. Outsourcing would be a reversal from the build-it-internally mentality
associated with K-World. As an example of the use of Alacra, see Exhibit 4.
Exhibit 4. Alacra Integration of Multiple Data Sources (Boom 2004)
10 Summary
It is not clear whether KPMG was able to “leap” the competition with K-World. However, they apparently
were able to implement and evolve a system that allowed them to pull together disparate systems and
facilitate collaboration and global decision support.
KPMG has had their knowledge management system evolve over time. KPMG has gone from having a
vision of a “Shadow Partner” that preceded virtually all professional service knowledge management
efforts, to being behind the other major professional services firms in knowledge management, to having a
knowledge management system so robust that apparently it could be spun off as its own firm in a
competitive knowledge management environment. In addition, based on the survey of the "Most Admired
Knowledge Enterprises," the resulting knowledge management was competitive with the best in the world
(Chase 2001). KPMG went from a firm that almost lost an entire country of offices to competitors because
of a lack of global knowledge management capabilities to a firm with a global network capable of sharing
information and supporting decisions on the largest engagements.
Global sharing and integrated decision support became important for more profitable global
engagements. Accordingly, KPMG found it necessary to guide the system away from a potential U.S.
focused system to one that would accommodate multiple cultures. KPMG used a technology adoption
model that tried to move users across the life cycle in parallel to system developments and evolution.
Two of the key emerging issues are client privacy and search. Ensuring that confidential knowledge is
not included among knowledge management resources that can be freely selected is important for assuring
16
client confidentiality. Further, as the number of documents, types of document, and sources of those
documents has increased, search has become a more important and more challenging. Ironically, not
including client information ultimately could hamper search. Consistent with KPMG’s organization
structure and history, apparently different countries have pursued their own solutions to improve K-World
search capabilities.
Ultimately, K-World continues to evolve as new and emerging changes are
considered.
Acknowledgement
The author would like to acknowledge the primary discussions with KPMG personnel Robert Zeibig,
Michael Turillo and Bernie Avishai and with other KPMG personnel regarding K-World and Cering. In
addition, I would like to thank Bob Elliott for his discussion of Shadow Partner and K-Web. I also would
like to thank the referees for their comments on earlier versions of this paper. Finally, I particularly would
like to thank Clyde Holsapple for his substantial comments on the previous version of the paper.
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